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Month: July 2015

No, I didn’t make it to Mount St. Helens today. Didn’t have set plans, of course, and Misha was actually being super-sweet. She decided to cuddle upon my lap in the 90° heat. Well, when your kitty is over 21 and you know time is short, when she wants to cuddle, you cuddle. So we did. And then Boo was busy on the bathmat, giving herself a bath, when I attempted to take a shower. And then Pipa wanted a walk. And then I went to get the car serviced, and then bought cat litter, and ended up leaving my tablet at the store, but happily some wonderful soul turned it in to customer service, so that was a little bit of all right. By the end of all that, though, I was done, and hadn’t even packed yet, so I decided I’d risk the party. I’m currently in the yard listening to a dude relate how he was interviewed by the FBI as an Unabomer suspect. This is an interesting bunch. The music’s good, too.

Yes, that is correct. I am so devoted to you, my darlings, that I blog for you during a party. That’s love, that is! Also, they’ve just started asking me what the word is for a flock of birds that swoops and divides and comes together again. They think murmuration. Damn it, Jim, I know rocks, not birds! I have no idea. So it’s over to you! There’s a bonus UFD sort of thing.

I’ve watched with increasing dismay as a person I admired very much, whose blog I read first thing every day, failed spectacularly to understand why her actions over the past year and more have been upsetting to trans women. I’m about to leave on a trip, so that’s as far into that quagmire as I’m wading for the moment. There’s something more important for me to say, anyway:

Between various things going on both in my personal life and online, my ability to cope with people is nearing absolute zero. Alas, our house is being invaded by a great many people starting tonight. I may stick around for the big par-tay, but I am most definitely cutting out for the rest of the weekend. Already got me reservations at a nice little place on the Lewis River, don’t I just? Already made plans to explore the air-conditioned wonders of the various west-side Mount St. Helens visitors’ centers with Suzanne, haven’t I? Ja, you betcha! Continue reading “I Am Abandoning Y’all For My Favorite Volcano. Yes, Again.”→

It’s International Tiger Day! The fifth annual, in fact – July 29th was designated as a day to bring attention to tiger conservation by the St. Petersburg Tiger Summit back in 2010. Tigers are in serious need of help: we’ve lost 97% or more of our wild tigers in the last century. There may be as few as 3,000 left in the wild. They’re in the worst shape of any of the big cats. Which is sad, because tigers are awesome!

B and I love Amy Schumer, so we had high hopes for Trainwreck. We even braved a packed house to see it on Sunday, when we’d normally wait until a few weeks after opening.

We enjoyed it, but neither one of us was bowled over by it. There were plenty of funny lines, and everyone in the theatre howled several times, so if you’re looking for a good, light rom-com, it’s a great choice. But it’s basically a standard of the genre. I was hoping for something more revolutionary. Amy does reverse a few tropes: it’s her character who’s playing the field, and the dudes who want the commitment. There are some truly hilarious moments, like the baby shower for her sister, where she gets to shock a lot of very sheltered people who make the mistake of deciding to play some confession game. LeBron James is pretty awesome as himself. In fact, there are many sports cameos, so you’ll enjoy that if you’re in to that sort of thing. Continue reading “Amy Schumer’s Trainwreck is More Like a Delay”→

Just so you know, I do love the new roomies, and the house is awesome, and most of the people I’ve met have been quite interesting. There are even many science-oriented ones! But there is also so much woo, I am not even kidding. I mean, we’re living atop a shaman, what could you expect?

Bruce asked me for any good lava tubes in the lower 48. I know of a few off the top of my head, but when I did the Google, no list of lava tubes came up that I could find. This is insupportable, as we used to say in French class! We need a list of lava tubes open to visitors, stat.

I’ll begin with the ones I know, and you, my darlings, can chime in with the ones you know, and by the end of this, we shall have a nice, relatively complete list we can then publish here and at Rosetta Stones so that people can find it. We can include Alaska, Hawaii, and US Territories as well, why not! If you’ve been, and have got photos and a brief description of your adventure that you wouldn’t mind sending me to publish, you can email me at dhunterauthor at gmail.

It appears you lot love lava lots! So, as per Bruce’s request, I brought you some more. Here is a fabulous a’a lava flow from Kilauea. Listen closely – you can hear a sound like a hundred champagne glasses breaking. Those are the clinkers, cooled bits of lava tumbling from atop the flow.

I’ve got many pretties for ye today, my darlings. I figured we’d return to our other volcano today, and enjoy all the pretty flowers, because what else could be better on a Saturday? Not much!

Mount Baker’s wildflower season peaked early this year, due to our unusual heat. Almost all the snow was gone, and the spring streams were dry. It didn’t matter to the monkeyflowers, though. They were in vigorous bloom, on the rocks, along the streams, and practically in the streams as well.

Lewis’ Monkeyflower

We encountered Lewis’ Monkeyflower all over the place, pinking up the local gray andesite, but my camera was not doing pink that day, so unfortunately I haven’t got many artistic shots of them. However, the Seep or Common Monkeyflowers were also in full bloom, and were even more happy growing in the streams, and my camera was doing yellow, so that worked out.

Seep Monkeyflower adorning the base of a rock in the stream.

I love how vibrant that is against the dark water, the gray rocks, and the swirls of algae.

And it wasn’t just the rocks that were being all mountain-lake delightful: enormous fallen logs that look just a bit like rocks themselves also played host to flowers, and looked fabulous.

Monkeyflowers dangling off a lovely large log.

There were enormous banks of purple daisies.

A vibrant bank of purple daisies.

You can see a few of the ubiquitous orange butterflies hanging about on the daisies. You’ll see that much closer soonish, because there were many butterflies, and they were all absolutely mad for those daisies.

The fireweed was just starting to come into its own, and it starred in many pretty scenes. Here it is with some pretty white daisies.

Fireweed with daisies.

Have you ever looked at the blooms in a fireweed stem up close? They’re really delicate and beautiful.

Fireweed flowers up close.

There’s even a cryptopod in that one, if you look closely enough!

And now, because you’ve all been very patient, I shall give thee flowers with volcanic scenery. Here is fireweed with a beautiful mountain tarn.

View of the tarn and cirque with fireweed in the foreground.

And here are some of Mount Baker’s plentiful andesite columns and lovely fireweed.

Volcanic columns peeking through the greenery.

Believe it or not, these are just a small sampling of all the flower photos I took. You can find many more over at Flickr if you’re not done enjoying the blossoms. I loved our trip to Mount St. Helens a lot, but when it comes to blooming things and pretty insects, Mount Baker has her beat this year. Superb!